Powering the fastest PC’s on the planet for almost a decade the compressor-based VapoChill® CPU cooler technology is now launched in a compact, reliable and highly effective solution: VapoChill MicroTM. The prospects for a new mainstream industry standard are solid.

Broenderslev, Denmark March 8th 2005 - asetek Inc. (DK), long-time market leader in high-end processor cooling technologies, has joined forces with the Leonhardt Group Industries (Germany) to launch a compact and highly effective CPU cooler technology. The already patented cooler technology, to be mass-marketed under the VapoChill MicroTM brand name, is based on the vapour phase principles of the compressor run VapoChill XEIITM and LSTM CPU coolers.

The VapoChill MicroTM CPU coolers are characterized by hermetically sealed gas/liquid chambers exploiting the most effective cooling principle available: phase change cooling. In the VapoChill MicroTM series the compressor is left out and recirculation of the coolant is based on gravity. In other words, no mechanical parts and basically unlimited reliability. The cooling process (evaporation) happens at ambient temperatures why condensation risks are nonexistent. Different from the heat pipe coolers currently dominating the market for high-end coolers the evaporator of the VapoChill MicroTM is placed – directly – on top of the CPU. The result is a CPU cooler offering the market’s best price/performance ratio as well as ultra low noise operation.

In a technology perspective the opportunities for optimizations and custom applications are very strong and OEM contracts for the VapoChill MicroTM cooler have already been signed. The 1st generation retail series of the VapoChill MicroTM supports ATX midi and tower cases. BTX will, expectedly, be supported in Q2 or early Q3 2005.

On the strategic partnership of asetek and Leonhardt Group Industries, Mr. Uwe Leonhardt, CEO of the latter says “It’s hard to imagine a strategic partnership with stronger synergies; both companies have very strong and highly specialized technology know-how. This, combined with our company’s experience in volume production and quality control and asetek’s extensive application expertise and industry network, is nothing less than ideal.” Mr. Eberhard Günther, Managing Shareholders of LG ThermoTechnologies, the LG Industries subsidiary in operational dialogue with asetek, points out further synergies: “The asetek / LG industries partnership facilitates unique opportunities to fast track future R&D cycles; we are certain that this partnership is a significant step towards the centre of the industry for mainstream CPU cooling”.

asetek CEO, Mr. André S. Eriksen, is no less enthusiastic about the outlook for both partnership and technology: ”Performance, Noise level, Reliability, Form factor support, Installation ease and Cost” are the 6 key drivers for the future standards of CPU cooling; the VapoChill MicroTM technology platform itself and the competencies held in this partnership holds a lot of promise for a significant impact on the market for CPU cooling – short term as well as long term.”

Launched at CeBIT 2005, March 10th, the VapoChill MicroTM retail series will be on live display on PC systems with ABIT (Hall 23/A50), AOPEN (Hall 23/D37), EPoX (Hall 23/A52), DFI (Hall 22/B03), and Albatron (Hall 23/B41). The current retail versions will support the CPU platforms of Intel P4 S478 and LGA775 and the AMD K8 (S754/S940/S939). Retail price indicator: from 27€ (excl. VAT). Availability: First volume shipments to the retail market is set to May 1st this year.